Thursday, July 1 at 10:30 AM

This morning before our Yellowbook staff meeting my "gud frind"/co-worker gave me a copy of an article from Southern Living: "Monroeville's Mockingbird: 50 Years after the debut of To Kill a Mockingbird, Harper Lee's Alabama hometown celebrates the book that made it famous."
What is that word again? Serendipity?
I have read the article as I sit here at the car dealership -- after the staff meeting and after my 50% benchmark review -- waiting for my car repair to be finished so that I can Head South and West.
The article is primarily about the town and author -- how much the town has changed and how much Nelle Harper Lee (Nelle to her friends) disdains the celebrity that has surrounded the town since the publication of her only completed novel. (The Monroeville bookstore doesn't stock Charles J. Shields's 2006 biography of Harper Lee because she doesn't like it. )
Harper, now eighty-four, has lived in Monroeville all her life.
The beauty and feel of that novel may be one small part of what I would like to capture on this trip, though I know with the practical, realist part of my brain that this will be impossible. I haven't looked at my Alabama map for some hours, but I don't think Monroeville is even on my itenerary. Just didn't think of it until Lisa gave me this article.
One sentence from the article stands out: "You can't put the past behind you without understanding what it was like." I strongly desire to understand what it was like, but I have no desire to put the past behind me. I'll keep it beside me, if I can.
I had originally planned to be miles down the road at 11:00 on Thursday morning, I sit at the car dealership writing this blog. He says the car is ready to go. "The paperwork is ready." I fear I know what that means.
I didn't pack the car last night because we were apart from one another. Now from the dealership lobby to home, to some of my own "roots" near Toccoa, Georgia.
More soon.